1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a mobile terminal and, more particularly, to an idle screen arrangement structure and an idle screen display method for a mobile terminal that enable easy switching between idle screens associated with particular functions through multi-tasking.
2. Description of the Related Art
Advances in information and communication technologies have enabled popularization of various mobile terminals such as mobile phones, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), mobile broadcast receivers and multimedia players.
Mobile terminals display various kinds of information through display units. During an idle state, a mobile terminal displays an idle screen or initial screen on a display unit. Normally, a pre-stored or pre-registered image is used as the idle screen.
The idle screen can be changed by user settings. However, tedious menu operations necessary for changing of the idle screen may cause inconvenience to the user. In addition, the idle screen is limited to a single image or a single function. For example, although the user desires to associate the idle screen with various items such as a photograph, a schedule representation, a universal time representation, and a list of shortcut numbers, the user can associate only one of them with the idle screen.
Currently, items usable as an idle screen have increased in number. For example, a photograph, a schedule representation, a universal time representation, a list of shortcut numbers, a list of shortcut icons, a list of favorite broadcast channels, a user-editable screen (hereinafter, a “my screen”), and a “my pet” game can be used as an idle screen of a mobile terminal.
Because of a small display area, a mobile terminal uses a multi-level tree-structured menu. Traversal of the multi-level menu in search of a particular function may cause inconvenience to a user. In particular, a large number of menu items may cause too much inconvenience to a novice user.